


Born Without

by Kragle (Lizardon)



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Big Brother Papyrus, Childhood Trauma, Gen, Growing Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-12
Updated: 2017-12-12
Packaged: 2019-02-13 23:14:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12994623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lizardon/pseuds/Kragle
Summary: Papyrus meets his little brother.





	Born Without

“FATHER, WHEN WILL MY LITTLE BROTHER BE READY FOR ME TO MEET HIM?” Papyrus shouted. He loved to shout. The only thing he loved more than shouting was everything and everyone, especially his new baby brother. He was going to shout all day long on the day when he got to meet his brother, he decided.

  
His father had just returned from his laboratory, where Papyrus's baby brother was being kept while he developed. He always looked tired after coming home, but today especially he looked totally worn down.

  
“Little spark, I'm sorry. I have some very bad news about your brother. His magical energy is developing healthily, yes. But his soul, it's not taking to the tethering spells I've put on it too well.”

  
“BUT YOU SAID THE SAME OF ME, FATHER, AND JUST LOOK HOW STRONG AND GREAT I AM! MY LITTLE BROTHER WILL BE JUST AS GREAT.” His father did not look so sure of that. He looked on the verge of crying, in fact.

  
“I don't think he will make it through the night, Papyrus. You can come to the lab to see him if you would like, but it will only be to say goodbye.”

  
Papyrus's face dropped. He had been so excited to meet his brother after months and months of waiting. He had planned all the games they would play, all the books he would make their father read them at bedtime, all the great puzzles they would puzzle. It was a lot to take in for the toddler skeleton. In fact, he was pretty sure he didn't exactly understand.

  
“FATHER, DID- DID YOU NAME HIM YET?” One of the books his father had read with him was a book on traditional skeleton monster names. He had always just called Papyrus 'son' or 'little spark' until that night. Papyrus decided he should have his own proper name, and he picked it out himself. The book said the name Papyrus was a name used by regal skeletons from the Nile River back on the surface. He loved it immediately, and it stuck.

  
“I don't think we should, little spark. It will hurt more to lose him.”

  
Papyrus shook his head no. “FATHER, HE NEEDS A NAME, SO HE KNOWS WE LOVE HIM AND WE WANT HIM TO KEEP FIGHTING.” His father made the face adults make when they're about to treat you like a baby, the one that's usually followed by 'You don't understand'.

  
“Very well. Get your book of names then, but be fast. I don't know how long he will last.”

  
He had not been in his father's lab since the process of creating his brother began. It had always been spooky but ultimately boring, but now it felt like entering a morgue. In the center of the room was a hospital bed surrounded by many different machines, each with its own spaghetti of wires spilling out onto the bed. In the center of the mass of wires was a ball of blankets. And in those blankets...

  
“IS THAT HIM, FATHER?” he was trying his best not to yell. It was so hard to keep his voice low. Even with all the bad news surrounding it, he was finally getting to meet his baby brother. He couldn't see anything besides wires and blankets from his place at the doorway, but he didn't know if he was allowed to get any closer.

  
“Go ahead, but don't touch him. He is too fragile.”

  
Papyrus suddenly realized he was terrified. He reached up to grab one of his father's huge bony hands and they walked together to the center of the room. His father pulled back a small amount of one of the blankets.

“WOWIE. HE'S SO-” Papyrus found for the first time in his young life that his voice was failing him. “TINY.”

The book of skeleton names had pictures of babybones in it. Papyrus had seen pictures of himself as a baby, too. The monster sleeping in this pile of blankets and covered in wires was the smallest he'd ever seen. He looked so very sickly, and if Papyrus had been frightened before, the sight of his brother had ramped it up to eleven. He could somewhat see the glow of the little skeleton's soul from underneath the blanket. Papyrus hated to admit it, but he was barely done being a babybones himself, and even he could tell something was wrong with the way his soul was glowing. He looked, well, he looked like he was dying.

  
“FATHER, I'M SCARED.” He knelt to meet Papyrus's eyes, and wrapped him in a hug.

  
“If you would like to, you can say goodbye from the other room. I need to stay with him now, though, so I can say goodbye, too.” Papyrus squeezed the book of names in his hands like hugging it would save the little thing in that bed.

  
“NOT UNTIL HE HAS HIS NAME.”

  
He pushed over one of his father's rolling chairs and spread the book open on it. He turned to a random page, and as if by fate there it was: the perfect name for his brother. He pointed it out to his father and he smiled sadly at Papyrus. It was stubby and chunky, much like the little skeleton. It was a prefix name, it could be followed with all sorts of things, which Papyrus decided was because his little brother had so many possibilities for his future, and not because all he was ever going to be was the start of an idea. It had another meaning, too, one Papyrus didn't know but his father did. His brother's name would be Sans, empty, without.

  
“Little Sans,” his father was speaking to the tiny monster in a hushed whisper, cradling his skull in between two gentle phalanges. “this is your brother, Papyrus. He loves you very much.”

  
“HELLO, SANS.” Papyrus's voice was getting all choked up from holding back crying. “IT IS VERY, VERY TRUE. I'M SO GLAD I GOT TO MEET YOU BEFORE-” He froze up thinking about what the 'before' was before. He couldn't pretend to be brave any longer. He hunkered down to the floor and wailed like the babiest of babybones. “FATHER, USE YOUR SCIENCE. DON'T LET SANS DUST, PLEASE.”

  
“I've done everything I can for him, little spark. His body just isn't holding together properly. Even if he makes it through tonight, there's no promise he'll make it through tomorrow, and no promise if he makes it through tomorrow that he'll make it through the next night. We have to be ready to say goodbye.”

Papyrus refused to say goodbye. He stood watch over his little brother all night, and when Sans didn't turn to dust, he stood watch over him all day the next day. He read every book he knew how to Sans, and when he ran out he told Sans stories he made up himself. For weeks he never strayed far from his brother, right in their father's creepy lab. Sans never dusted, but he never stabilized either, and their father could only wait dreadfully for the day when Papyrus would have to accept his brother was gone. He moved quietly in the background, leaving Papyrus meals, or giving Sans hospice. He wasn't sure if exposing someone as young as Papyrus to the slow certainty of death was healthy for him mentally, yet he also couldn't help but wonder if Papyrus's determination was what was keeping Sans alive. Determination did strange things to monsters, after all.

They eventually moved into the lab together full time. Sans was showing no signs of dying anytime soon, but he was still in very unstable condition and needed to be constantly monitored, so it was simpler just to bring the house to him instead of the other way around. Months had past, and it even seemed Sans was getting a little healthier. He was growing, he was roughly the size a skeleton monster half his age should be. Papyrus had started school, and no longer spent every waking moment at his brother's bedside. Which isn't to say he didn't spend any time at his brother's bedside, of course. He loved to come home from school, and excitedly babble about all the things he was learning to Sans. By two years old Sans could sit up on his own for short periods of time, and had even managed to crawl out of his bed once. He was a normal baby monster in every way besides his size, and how alarmingly weak he seemed to be. The day that their father had been dreading, when Papyrus would burst through the door after school and find a dust pile where his brother had been, never seemed to come. Maybe his littlest spark would pull through. There were times when it seemed bad, Sans would watch his brother run and yell and play, and it was clear he wished he was doing the same thing. Sometimes he would strain himself too hard trying to imitate his big brother, and his soul would pitter-patter weakly in his little ribcage and his father would be sure that this was it, but then it never was. Papyrus had learned patience when playing with his brother from those scares.

Sans may have been weak, but he was smart. Papyrus was a bit of a bonehead, but nothing got by Sans. He was reading well before he was walking, made only slightly less impressive by how long it took him to be strong enough to walk. It had been decided that he should stay out of school for a few years, but he seemed to be much more interested in his father's work studying quantum physics than in learning his ABCs with monsters his age, anyway. Sometimes Sans would space out, just staring at nothing, and that would freak Papyrus out, but then he was all smiles. Smiles, and those horrible puns he had started saying. Their father would joke that he had the body of a two year old, the brains of a thirty year old, and the sense of humor of an old lady. As the skeletons grew up, onlookers would say it was hard to tell who was the older brother and who was the younger. One skeleton would be running around yelling about how he was the coolest and strongest guy in the whole world, and one would be hobbling quietly behind with his lack of nose in some college textbook. They were quite a pair, as recognizable as they were inseparable. As Sans learned to use magic, the gap between brothers closed further still. His pool of magic was so deep that he taught himself to rely on spells where his physical strength failed him. Finally, it seemed like Sans had fought for his own place in the world, and those worries their father harbored that he would one day fall to dust without warning were all behind them. Sans was alive, and nothing was ever going to take him away from his family.

But the truth was Sans was always, always, just one single, tiny misstep away from death. And one day, maybe in another time, or another reality, that truth was going to catch up with him.

**Author's Note:**

> I know popular fanon (and also the official Japanese translation, maybe?) says Papyrus is the younger brother but I've always headcanoned him as older, and nothing like pesky 'semi-canon' or whatever is going to change my stance.


End file.
